Iran Demands $4 Bln from Russia Over Canceled Missile Deal

Iran’s Defense Ministry and The Aerospace Industries Organization have launched a $4 bln law suit against Russia’s state arms corporation Rosoboronexport in an international court in Geneva over a deal to buy missiles suspended by Russia, Rosoboronexport said in its annual report.
“The case was started on April 13, 2011. The subject of the case is “Possible damages of $3,985,159,773.32 to fulfil obligations for delivery of special property,” the report says in reference to ongoing legal cases.
The case has not yet been heard, the report says.
In June 2010, the UN Security Council passed a resolution imposing sanctions on Iran, including suspension of arms deliveries. Russia responded by saying it would cancel a contract to deliver S-300 missiles to Iran, and subsequently returned a $166.8 million deposit.
Iran has previously applied to the International Court of Justice to try to force Russia to fulfil the terms of a 2007 contract to deliver S-300 air defense missile systems or pay compensation.

Raytheon and US Navy Begin MALD-J Super Hornet Integration

The U.S. Navy and Raytheon Company have begun integrating the Miniature Air Launched Decoy Jammer variant into the U.S. Navy’s fleet of F/A-18 E/F Super Hornets. The integration process will include a series of risk reduction activities and technology demonstrations.

MALD is a state-of-the-art, low-cost flight vehicle that is modular, air-launched and programmable. It weighs less than 300 pounds and has a range of approximately 500 nautical miles (about 575 statute miles). MALD protects aircraft and their crews by duplicating the combat flight profiles and signatures of U.S. and allied aircraft. The MALD-J adds radar-jamming capability to the basic MALD platform.

“MALD will save sailors lives because it saturates enemy integrated air defense systems, causing them to attack the wrong target instead of attacking our aircraft,” said Harry Schulte, vice president of Air Warfare Systems for Raytheon Missile Systems.

To ensure that MALD is suitable for shipboard operations, Raytheon is working with the U.S. Navy to make sure the weapon is capable of withstanding the rigors of taking off and landing on aircraft carriers. Raytheon is also leveraging MALD’s modularity, enabling sailors to rapidly change the weapon’s electronic warfare payload in response to threats.

About MALD

MALD confuses enemy air defenses by duplicating friendly aircraft flight profiles, radar signatures.

MALD-J keeps all capabilities of MALD and adds jamming capabilities.

Raytheon is scheduled to begin delivering MALD-Js later this year.

Indian Participation In Tokyo Conference On Afghanistan

An Old horse with the beauty

Can we have photo together

Coming out tonight

Why All Women behind

Good they have $15 billion 

India at the Forefront of Growth for Defence Spend: F-INSAS Updates from the Indian Army

The 2^nd Annual Soldier Modernisation Conference, hosted by Defence IQ in collaboration with the Indian Army, has been confirmed to take place 11-13 September 2012 at the Sheraton Hotel in New Delhi, India.  This year’s programme focuses on the highly publicised F-INSAS programme, estimated at a $10Bnforecasting budget, with Lieutenant General Vinod Bhatia, Director General, Directorate Infantry and Lieutenant General Sumer Singh, Director General, Directorate Perspective Planning – both representing the Indian Army - to lead discussions on capability gaps and perspective planning for infantry requirements up to 2020+.

Lieutenant General Bhatia and Lieutenant General Singh are joined by senior representatives of the Indian Army as well as the DRDO – the Defence Research and Development Organisation in India - on the speaker faculty, which already featuresinternational military participation from the US, Israel,Czech Republic, Italy, Croatia and Spain, amongst others.

The main purpose of the event is to present attendees the much-needed networking platform for international industry professionals to meet senior military decision-makers responsible for the major programmes – notably F-INSAS – within India’s defence organisations, and to hear directlyIndia’s current priorities and ambitious future requirements.

Whilst there is still much speculation on the plans of the Indian Army for allocations and contracts, with global organisations weighing out their priorities between India and other emerging markets such as the Middle East, India undeniably remains at the forefront of growth in the world in terms of defence spending.

According to Visiongain’s analytical report, “The Indian Defence Market 2012-2022,” it is estimated that India will spend $38.51 billion on defence in 2012 alone.

As UPI.com quotes from the study: “Despite the continued existence of restraints on the market such as slow tender processes and a dominant state sector, huge opportunities exist for a wide variety of defence firms.  Those who are willing to work within the Indian government framework for indigenization of production will find themselves in a potentially long-term and lucrative arrangement.”

The conference features speakers from the Indian MoD, Indian Army, DRDO, and representatives of local and international industry.  Visit http://www.soldiermodindia.com

Mahindra & Mahindra may bid for Hawker Beechcraft

Mahindra & Mahindra, India’s biggest tractor and utility vehicle maker, may be considering a bid for Hawker Beechcraft; the bankrupt aircraft maker, Bloomberg said on Wednesday.

Hawker Beechcraft, part owned by Goldman Sachs Group, is on the selling block and the agency said that the Indian automobile firm with manufacturing interests in turbo prop aircrafts may be a likely suitor.

Hemant Luthra, who heads Mahindra Systech, declined to comment on the speculation. “We are small players in the business of turbo prop aircraft and we have been watching what’s happening with Hawker Beechcraft , which is in the public domain.

Apart from this we don’t want to comment,” he added. M&M entered the aerospace industry in 2009 by acquiring Aerostaff Australia, a component manufacturer, and Gippsland Aeronautics, a maker of turboprop aircraft.

Hawker, which makes the Beechcraft King Air turboprop and Hawker 4000 business jet, filed a reorganisation plan in the US Bankruptcy Court on June 30 that would give control of the company to secured creditors who hold debt valued at almost $922 million.

According to reports, investment banker Perella Weinberg Partners developed a list of more than 35 bidders, which was further shortlisted to six bidders.

India is participating in the largest US-led naval war

India is participating in the largest US-led naval war games but shhhhh, don’t tell anyone because China does not like it.

An Indian Navy commodore will join nearly 45,000 soldiers from 22 countries at Hawaii for RIMPAC 2012, hosted by the US Pacific Command.RIMPAC is a real warfare exercise involving aircraft carriers, submarines, live firing, aircraft, anti-submarine warfare and amphibious operations by elements like the Marine Corps.

The scale of this edition of RIMPAC most likely makes it the largest maritime warfare exercise.

RIMPAC, held once every two years, began in 1971 as a drill to stave off the Soviet Pacific fleet during the Cold War years.

But since then it has evolved into war games that the US hosts with rim of the Pacific Ocean countries in scenarios that envisage North Korea invading South Korea or hostilities in the event of Taiwan declaring its independence from China.

Russia has joined RIMPAC for the first time this year with four warships.

The Indian participation is token. Its naval attaché based in Washington DC has been asked to represent the Indian Navy. Navy sources said India was an “observer” at the exercises that began on June 27 and will continue till August 7.

But the official website for RIMPAC 2012 lists the Indian Navy representative as a “fleet component commander”.

The scale of this year’s exercise and the Indian participation has attracted adverse comments from China, which has not been invited.

“The United States is using this exercise to show off its military strength, seeking military alliances in order to contain the military rise of another country in the region. Such (a) scheme is so thoroughly exposed now,” Chinese Communist Party newspaperPeople’s Daily has observed.

“It is obvious that the purpose of the U.S. calling in these many allies to conduct joint exercises is to exert pressure onto certain neighbouring countries through military drills, as well as to (examine) the combat readiness of the U.S. military,” the newspaper said.

The Chinese are particularly angry over the participation of India and Russia.

In a statement in Hawaii on Wednesday, Vice-Admiral Gerald Beaman, the chief of the US Navy’s Third Fleet and the commander of RIMPAC 2012 said: “It is going to be very significant and the main reason we are building these maritime partnerships during the RIMPAC exercises is exactly why we want to maintain our relationship with India, to help provide stable and secure international commerce through the sea-lanes…Our relationship with India will remain significant during the coming years.”

The importance accorded to India’s participation, token though it may be, by the US coincides with the alteration of the Pentagon’s strategic “rebalancing” of forces from the Middle East to the Asia-Pacific. US defence secretary Leon Panetta had said in New Delhi last month that nearly six carrier battle groups of the US would be deployed in the Asia-Pacific region.

The Indian Navy believes that participating in such exercises helps it keep abreast of modern trends in naval warfare. RIMPAC 2012, for example, is showcasing what has come to be called “the great green fleet”.

In a one of its kind deal, the US bought tens of thousands of gallons of biofuel that will power the vessels in the exercise.

But India’s participation in RIMPAC 2012 tests defence minister A.K. Antony’s insistence that Indian forces should only engage in bilateral exercises and not be seen as part of a potential coalition.

China had objected to the Malabar exercise in 2007 that India hosted in the Bay of Bengal.

Though the Malabar series is with the US, five other navies had participated in that exercise.

Last month, four Indian ships also berthed at China’s Shanghai port and engaged in a friendly passage exercise.

First Test Of Indian Nirbhay Cruise Missile Looms

In contrast to how India promoted its Agni-V ballistic missile, New Delhi is unlikely to draw a lot of international attention to upcoming testing of the Nirbhay cruise missile, even as it holds far more significance for the nation’s weapons program than is widely appreciated.

In August, the country is scheduled to conduct the first test of its little known Nirbhay (“fearless”), a subsonic weapon with a maximum range of 1,000 km (620 mi.). Designated “secret,” the weapon’s development has remained concealed since its existence was revealed in 2006.

Like the Agni-V, the Nirbhay will be tested from India’s missile range over the Bay of Bengal. The missile has two stages, is understood to be powered by a Russian-built NPO Saturn engine, will cruise at Mach 0.7 and is being developed to demonstrate loitering capabilities. Sources at the Hyderabad-based Advanced Systems Laboratory (ASL), which built the missile prototype, say the weapon is ready for its first flight.

ASL Director V.G. Sekaran recently said the Nirbhay was slated for a July-August debut. While the agency has refused to comment on the Nirbhay’s capabilities, there remains some ambiguity about whether the “Nirbhay” name pertains only to the primary weapon—the subsonic cruise missile—or to a family, including a yet-unnamed, long-range, scramjet-powered supersonic cruise missile.

The ambiguity is an inevitable part of the project’s secret status. The agency has worked with intrigue before; last July, it tested the Prahaar quick-reaction, surface-to-surface missile after first revealing the existence of the system barely two weeks before.

The Indian armed forces are watching the Nirbhay with perhaps greater focus than they did the Agni. While the country’s weapons program has matured in the ballistic missile arena, it has little or nothing to show in cruise missiles. In the Indo-Russian BrahMos, Russia still builds critical technologies such as the engine and seeker, while India contributes the inertial navigation and fire control systems. On the Nirbhay, while Russia is understood to have contributed the engine, sources say it will be replaced with an Indian turbojet or tubofan in a later phase.

“In many ways, the Nirbhay is a more crucial weapon system than the Agni family,” says an officer with one of the Indian army’s BrahMos missile regiments. “The lack of a long-range cruise missile has long been felt by the armed forces. The BrahMos is an excellent border weapon, but we need a terrain-hugging missile with a range of 750-1,000 kilometers for more potent deterrent value. That’s why we’re waiting for the Nirbhay more than we’ve perhaps waited for anything in the last 20 years.” The BrahMos supersonic cruise missile has a stated range of 290 km.

In 2007, India’s Defense Research and Development Organization (DRDO) revealed that the Nirbhay would be capable of delivering 24 different warhead types. DRDO sources say that while the engine is Russian, the rest of Nirbhay is fully indigenous, including sensors, guidance and flight-control systems. In 2008, reports suggested the Nirbhay was a loose derivative of the indigenous Lakshya target drone, which is operational with the armed forces. A mockup of the Nirbhay was to have been displayed at Aero India in February 2011, but was pulled at the last moment after a change of heart at DRDO.

A former rear admiral from the Indian navy’s gunnery says, “The Nirbhay is rightly a hushed-up program. It shouldn’t draw too much attention until it has begun testing in earnest. Three years ago, there was a lot of confidence in the program and scientists were confident they could deliver such an ambitious weapon. It is a clean break from anything India has developed before.”

The Nirbhay has never been seen or photographed, and India wants to keep it that way until the actual debut test. DRDO sources say the missile is being built to be used from land, sea and air. The Center for Military Airworthiness and Certification has revealed that it has been asked to integrate the Nirbhay to an Indian air force Sukhoi Su-30 MKI airframe, while the land variant’s mobile launcher was recently revealed to be an Indian-built Tata Prahaar vehicle unveiled at New Delhi’s DefExpo trade event in March.

Air force to resume operation to salvage missing MIG-29 pilot

Nine months after a combat plane – MIG 29 – crashed in the treacherous mountains of the Lahual Valley, Indian Air Force and the Army will launch a joint operation to salvage the missing pilot and the flight data recorder.

Rise in temperature triggering snow melt in the mountains have revived hopes of locating the wreckage of the plane that reportedly exploded in air during nocturnal combat exercise.

Two planes had left Adampur air base in Jalandhar on October 18, last year. While one came back safely, the other plane went missing.

Due to heavy snow and hostile weather the air force had called off the operation last November. Operation to retrieve plane wreckage will resume from July 20.

“Indian Air Force has sent a communiqué to resume the search operation shortly,” deputy commissioner Lahual and Spiti Shyam Singh Guleria confirmed to Hindustan Times.

As many as 50 air force and army personnel’s from are expected to participate on the search operations.

“Team from air force station will arrive here shortly,” says Guleria, while adding that district administration is also sending a team of trekkers from Atal Bihari Vajpayee Institute of Mountaineering to recce the area that was earlier marked by the air force.

Family of the missing pilot also met the deputy commissioner and visited the nearby villages to the find any trace of the 32-year-old squadron leader DS Tomar.

After the plane went missing, the Indian Air Force had launched a salvage operation arguably one of the biggest in the country till date to locate it.

Apart from locals, the air force had requisitioned elite mountaineers from Darjeeling.

Indian Air Force had called in mountaineers from army’s High Altitude Warfare School (HAWS) to supplement ground search initiated on peaks between Chokang village and Gangsten glacier, where the local villagers heard the explosion.

Equipped with sophisticated search equipment to trace the debris of the plane buried under snow engineers from 17 Engineering Regiment has conducted ground search along with Three Ladakh Scout Battalion and One Battalion from Jammu and Kashmir Rifles.

Army units involved in the search operations had also pressed into service sniffer dogs to locate the missing pilot.

Last year, the family of the missing pilot announced a reward of Rs. 50,000 for the locals for any vital information. This time they hope to find him.

Recently the family members of Tomar were in district headquarters Keylong and visted Miarh valley and even met villagers of Naingarh located at an altitude of 13,000feet.

They also visited remote Darcha in hope that they could get some clue about the pilot.

“Kins of missing pilot met the villagers here few days back and they would return back when the air force resumes operations,” a police official at Keylong said.

District administration had distributed photographs and posters giving details about the missing pilot.

The posters are being distributed to trekkers climbing the peaks and the local shepherds who along with flocks move to higher altitudes during summers.

The IAF had last year managed to locate some parts of the crashed aircraft with the help of the army and local villagers but the main wreckage was not found.

It had deployed its unmanned aerial vehicles and fighter aircraft such as the SU-30MKI and Jaguars to locate the aircraft and has flown close to 160 sorties for the search.

All About SU 30 MKI

The Su-30MKI contains not only Russian, French, South African and Israeli Customer Furnished Equipment (CFE), but also a substantial percentage of Indian designed and manufactured avionics. They took six years to develop from start to MKI. Advanced avionics were developed by DRDO under a project code named "Vetrivale" (a Tamil name for the victorious lance carried by the youthful Lord Karthikeya or Murugan, a son of Parvati and Shiva) in close collaboration with the PSUs and the IAF. Indian avionics have been received and acknowledged enthusiastically by the Russian principals.

The following are the components developed by Indian agencies:

Mission Computer cum Display Processor - MC-486 and DP-30MK (Defence Avionics Research Establishment - DARE)
Radar Computer - RC1 and RC2 (DARE)
Tarang Mk2 Radar Warning Receiver (RWR) + High Accuracy Direction Finding Module (HADF) (DARE)
IFF-1410A - Identification Friend or Foe (IFF)
Integrated Communication suite INCOM 1210A (HAL)
Radar Altimeter - RAM-1701 (HAL)
Programmable Signal Processor (PSP) - (LRDE)
Multi Function Displays (MFD) - Samtel/DARE

The 32-bit Mission Computer performs mission-oriented computations, flight management, reconfiguration-cum-redundancy management and in-flight systems self-tests. In compliance with MIL-STD-1521 and 2167A standards, Ada language has been adopted for the mission computer's software. The other DARE-developed product, the Tarang Mk2 (Tranquil) radar warning receiver, is manufactured by state-owned BEL at its Bangalore facility.

These avionics equipment have also been certified for their airworthiness in meeting the demanding standards of Russian military aviation. The cumulative value of such indigenous avionic equipment is estimated to exceed Rs. 250 lakhs per aircraft. Since the core avionics were developed by a single agency (DRDO) - they have significant commonality of hardware and software amongst them using a modular approach to design. This obviously results in major cost and time savings in development; it also benefits the user in maintenance and spares inventories.

The DRDO has gone a step further and come out with a new design of the Core Avionics Computer (CAC) which can be use.

Strengthening its presence along Pakistan border, the Indian Air Force will deploy two squadrons of its frontline air superiority Su-30MKI fighter. IAF have decided to deploy two squadrons of Su-30MKI fighter squadrons within July 2011.

Jodhpur will be the first Su-30MKI base along the Pakistan border. Till now, the IAF has deployed its main strike fighter in Lohegaon near Pune, Bareilly, and Tezpur and Chabua in Assam. IAF also plans to deploy the aircraft at its Halwara air base in Punjab. IAF has started operating Su-30s in high-altitude areas too and its squadrons on a regular basis practice flights from the Leh air base in Jammu and Kashmir.

On deployment of the Akash missile, the medium range surface-to-air missile developed by DRDO , two squadrons armed with these missiles are set to be deployed, of which one will be at the SWAC region in Pune. The other will be at Gwalior, "Besides this, six more squadrons will be deployed in the region to check any threat from China."

The SWAC will be the first air command to have this modern radar technology. The MPR has been developed with a view to detect small targets at ranges greater than 300 km. Proposals are on to develop the Deesa airport as a full-fledged air base.

India is planning to deploy its 290km range supersonic BrahMos cruise missile on the Fifth Generation Fighter Aircraft (FGFA) being developed with Russia. FGFA is joint venture aircraft development programme between India and Russia under which India will induct 250-300 of these advanced planes. The missile is already being developed for deployment on Su-30MKIs of the Indian Air Force.

India have deployed nuclear-armed ballistic missiles on India china and India Pakistan border. The missiles would provide a deterrent to the use of nuclear weapons by either Pakistan or China; the weapons would symbolize India’s status as a great nation.

Scrappy Indian Navy Copter Bid Nears End

The Indian Navy's delayed 16 multirole helicopter (MRH) procurement programme is all set for the opening of commercial bids shortly. The programme has the NHIndustries NH90 squaring off against the Sikorsky S-70B Sea Hawk for a contract potentially worth $1-billion. Field evaluation trials were conducted late last year.

Indications are that the Indian government could hand this one to Sikorsky. But nothing is finished yet, and things have been far from smoothe.

As things speed towards the concluding leg of the acquisition, the Navy will be hoping it has seen the last of a controversy that still threatens to put a spanner in the works -- never a far cry in Indian defence contracting. Reports began to appear in the press earlier this year about how AgustaWestland (joint venture partner in NHIndustries, and company lead in India) had written a series of letters to the MoD protesting against what it saw as a lack of fair play -- in other words, preferential waivers on performance/platform parameters/configuration to Sikorsky's bird. The reports also detailed how the Indian Navy had hit back hard, accusing NHIndustries of a variety of misdemeanours, including "twisting" and "falsifying" elements of the NSQR/RFP -- something that NHIndustries denied. As a result of this back and forth, which still incidentally isn't really over, the acquisition already has a shadow over it. Officially, the Navy has clarified that both platforms -- the NH90 and Seahawk -- met NSQRs (though, of course, NHI insists that the Seahawk is compliant only as a result of alleged relaxations).

The chief complaint letter was written by NHIndustries managing director Domenico Vaccari to Defence Minister A.K. Antony following field trials last year, alleging that the S-70B wouldn't have cleared eight particular parameters if the NSQR hadn't been glossed over preferentially. It is understood that Vaccari wrote that letter to Antony since a previous letter by AgustaWestland senior veep for international business development Giacomo Saponaro to Defence Secretary Shashikant Sharma wasn't answered.

According to the Navy, the trials were conducted "professionally, equally" and "without any concessions -- certainly none that were not provided to both contenders on a mutually acceptable basis." The Navy has not commented on specific allegations pertaining to its NSQR.Things are, therefore, delicately poised for NHIndustries. It has already managed to irritate the Navy (quite clear from how the Navy responded to the company's letters to the MoD), though  annoyance should presumably have no bearing at this late stage of the game. There's also deep irony to NHIndustry's allegations that the playing field is anything but level. Just over two years ago, right before the Indian government awarded a prestigious $700-million contract for 12 VVIP transport helicopters to AgustaWestland, Sikorsky (which lost out with its S-92) wrote to the MoD asking for an explanation about certain "concessions" it believed had been granted to its competitor. It's a replay now, only the sides are switched.

In simple words, the Indian Navy's official line is this: The only reason a competitor would protest before a decision is that they're sure they are going to lose or if they did not, for whatever reason, want to compete (i.e. they wanted a government-to-government deal). At this stage, nobody is in a position to judge who is ahead. Both platforms have met requirements.

On the other hand, sources suggest there are extraneous factors that could have predetermined the outcome of this particular competition already. It was only a few months ago that the Indian government informed Parliament that Italian investigations into alleged corruption at AgustaWestland had nothing to do with the Indian deal. But the issue raised enough heat and friction, and the fact that the helicopters were ordered for the country's politicians -- not the armed forces -- got it even more traction. Sources say the government is unlikely to want to take any chances.

The MRH is intended to augment and then replace the Indian Navy's fleet of Westland Seakings. The Navy is also in the process of evaluating upgrade packages for the old Seakings. The 16-chopper MRH competition is to be followed by the N-MRH (just in case nomenclature wasn't confusing enough), a separate tender for 44 helicopters. Lockheed-Martin's MH-60R -- based on the same airframe as the S-70B -- and which was ignored in the MRH, will be a contender.

Photos of LCH trials

INS Vikramaditya (nee Gorshkov) on sea trials and Exculsive Photos